In today's edition, Steve Kornacki dives into recent midterm history to show what Republicans are up against as they seek to maintain their House majority next year. Plus, Bridget Bowman explores why so many independents are running for statewide office. — Adam Wollner Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here to receive it weekdays. |
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| With their megabill signed into law, Republicans seek to buck midterm history |
Analysis by Steve Kornacki |
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As it made its way through Congress, the "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" received consistently low marks from the public. This has fed Democratic optimism as the 2026 midterm playing field begins to take shape. Previous unpopular legislative pushes from presidents are being invoked, from Bill Clinton’s 1993 tax hike to Barack Obama’s health-care overhaul in 2010 to the Donald Trump-led GOP’s unsuccessful Obamacare repeal attempt in 2017. All of these efforts preceded dire midterm losses by the party that controlled the White House, an outcome Democrats believe is on the table now. Republicans, meanwhile, face the task of either reversing voters’ views of the Trump megabill or shifting the focus away from it and onto other issues where they are better positioned politically. And they must do this with the weight of midterm history stacked against them. This is particularly stark when it comes to the House, where Republicans have just 220 seats. That means that a net loss of just three would cost them their majority next year. And here’s how the president’s party has fared over the last 15 midterms: |
Note that in only two cases did the White House party manage to pick up House seats. And both come with a ready explanation. When Clinton’s Democrats gained five seats in 1998, it coincided with the GOP’s wildly unpopular impeachment effort, which fomented a backlash and drove up the president’s approval rating (68% in the exit poll). And the Republicans’ gain of eight seats in 2002 came just a year after 9/11, when public support for President George W. Bush remained unusually strong and deep. There were also minimal losses suffered by Republicans in 1986 and 1990, although those can be chalked up in large part to how diminished the House GOP ranks already were heading into those midterms. Simply put, there just weren’t that many seats left for Republicans to lose in those years. So, is there anything here Trump’s GOP can take solace from now? Ironically, it’s the most recent entry on the list. In 2022, Joe Biden’s approval rating was barely at 40%, a level that has often correlated with heavy midterm losses. And Biden and his party were also saddled with an unpopular legislative achievement, the Inflation Reduction Act. But despite forecasts of a bloodbath, Democrats lost only a net of nine House seats, coming far closer to retaining their majority than anyone had expected. It’s a matter of debate what exactly caused this, but the bottom line is that a sizable number of voters with negative views of Biden and his agenda nonetheless voted for Democratic candidates. Some combination of negative views of Trump, the Republican Party and individual Republican candidates likely played a role. Trump’s current approval rating is at 46.4%, according to the RealClearPolitics polling average. That’s four points better than Biden’s was on Election Day 2022 and also three points above where Trump himself was during his first midterm in 2018, when his party lost 41 House seats. Historically speaking, though, it’s still a perilous place for an incumbent to be. While Republicans certainly hope that Trump can maintain and even improve on his current standing, their bigger hope may lie in our latest NBC News Decision Desk poll, which found that 57% of Americans have a negative view of the Democratic Party. If they can push that number even higher, it could offer them their best – and maybe only – chance at defying midterm history. |
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Dan Osborn is the latest independent to launch a statewide run |
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Dan Osborn, a mechanic and Navy veteran, is launching another run for Senate in Nebraska, becoming the latest candidate to run for statewide office who is looking to capitalize on voters’ disdain for both parties. “I want to show people that we can get back to working with a government that's by and for the people and not for the 1% and the corporations,” Osborn said in an interview with NBC News ahead of his launch on Tuesday. Republicans have already signaled they plan to replicate the playbook they used against Osborn last year and paint him as a Democrat masquerading as an independent. Osborn made a surprisingly competitive run against GOP Sen. Deb Fischer last year, losing by 7 points as Trump carried Nebraska by 20 points. But Osborn contends he is a “lifelong independent,” not having registered to vote with either party and describing himself as fiscally conservative and more socially liberal. He could have a slightly easier time campaigning without a party label than other independent Senate candidates running in deeply Republican states who have clearer, and recent, ties to the Democratic Party. In Mississippi, Ty Pinkins left the Democratic Party to challenge GOP Sen. Cindy Hyde-Smith as an independent in 2026. But he has run for office multiple times as a Democrat, including an unsuccessful race last year against GOP Sen. Roger Wicker. In Idaho, former state Rep. Todd Achilles, another Democrat-turned-independent, is running against Republican Senate Jim Risch. And in South Dakota, retired Air Force Lt. Col. Brian Bengs launched an independent bid against GOP Sen. Mike Rounds after losing a 2022 Senate race as a Democrat. This new wave of independent Senate campaigns underscore just how toxic the Democratic brand has become in ruby red states. Bengs, for example, told The New York Times that voters “ruled out any possibility of supporting me because the letter ‘D’ was beside my name.” Meanwhile, Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan, a longtime Democrat, is running as a third-party candidate for governor of battleground Michigan. But recent history shows other independent candidates have struggled to overcome the partisan bent of their states or compete against the two major parties. The last time voters sent a new independent candidate to the Senate was in 2012, when Maine’s Angus King won his first term, and that was after he had served as the state’s governor. King and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., have easily won re-election since their first campaigns and caucus with Democrats. There are currently no independent governors.
Still, these candidates believe they have an opening among voters who have negative views of Republicans and Democrats. As Duggan recently told NBC News, “Every place I go, the depth of anger at the two parties runs deep.”
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🗞️ Today's other top stories |
🇺🇦 Ukraine reversal: Trump expressed mounting frustration with Russian President Vladimir Putin, promising during a lively Cabinet meeting to boost U.S. military aid to Ukraine. “We get a lot of bull--- thrown at us by Putin, if you want to know the truth,” Trump told reporters. Read more → 📦 Latest from the trade wars: Trump said there would be “no extensions” granted to the new Aug. 1 deadline he set for U.S. trading partners to negotiate new deals or face significantly higher tariffs on goods imported from their countries. Read more → ⚖️ SCOTUS watch: The Supreme Court allowed Trump at least temporarily to move ahead with plans to impose reductions in force and reorganize various government agencies. Read more → 📄 Epstein memo backlash: Conservative internet and media personalities are criticizing Attorney General Pam Bondi and the Trump administration after a recent government memo appeared to contradict statements Bondi made about the case of convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein. Read more → 🤖 New frontiers: Grok, Elon Musk's AI chatbot, seems to have gotten a right-wing update after the X owner complained it was parroting “woke” internet content. Read more → ⛪ Church and state: The Internal Revenue Service said in a court filing that churches can endorse political candidates without fear of losing their tax-exempt status. Read more → 🚫 Big, beautiful fallout: A federal judge temporarily blocked the Trump administration from barring Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood under a provision of the Republicans’ sweeping tax and spending package. Read more → 🩺 Big, beautiful fallout, cont.: A provision tucked inside the bill will make it harder for thousands of aspiring doctors to finance their education as the country faces a growing shortage in that profession. Read more → ➡️ There’s good news today: Minnesota state Sen. John Hoffman, who was wounded in last month’s deadly political shootings, has been released from intensive care. Read more → 👟 News you can use: The Transportation Safety Administration will allow passengers at selected airports to keep their footwear on as they go through security checkpoints. Read more → Follow live politics updates → |
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That’s all from the Politics Desk for now. Thanks to Dylan Ebs for helping compile today's newsletter. If you have feedback — likes or dislikes — email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.com. And if you’re a fan, please share with everyone and anyone. They can sign up here. |
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